RT Journal Article
T1 Macbeth and the Passions’ “Proper Stuff”
A1 Luis Martínez, Zenón
AB This essay examines early modern conceptions andrepresentations of the passions in relation to issues of selfknowledgein texts ranging from Renaissance psychology toShakespearean tragedy –with a particular focus on Macbeth.Considered in essence processes of the mind, the passions werebelieved to manifest themselves through material symptoms suchas bodily effects, facial gestures and discourse. Accordingly, theearly modern philosophy of man saw in the study of thesematerial manifestations a vehicle to access the soul. By tracing themethodologies for translating the material side of humanexperience –words, gestures, bodily sensations and signals– intoless material truths, early modern philosophy and theatreexplored the certainties about inwardness as a necessarydimension of the self, as well as the uncertainties about theultimate essence of such interiority. In this, Shakespeare’sMacbeth, for its constant focus on outward appearance andrhetoric, stresses the need to focus on matter as a vehicle toexplore interiority. And yet –and in keeping with the principles ofearlier Renaissance humanists– the play acknowledges the utterimpossibility to know the ultimate essence of the inward self.
PB Sociedad Hispano-Portuguesa de Estudios Renacentistas Ingleses
YR 2010
FD 2010
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10272/13888
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10272/13888
LA eng
NO Luis Martínez, Z.: Macbeth and the Passions’ “Proper Stuff”". SEDERI. Yearbook of the Spanish and Portuguese Society for English Renaissance Studies. Nº 20, págs. 71-101, (2010). ISSN 1135-7789
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Huelva
RD 1 jun 2026